A pandemic isn’t the only occurrence that makes life more than we bargained for. Certainly, a phenomenon like the Covid-19 virus gets our attention in a huge and personal way. However, into each life drop instances of joy, events that are horrific, and a whole lot of day-to-day existence, which gives continual opportunities for gratitude – “another day above ground,” as it’s said.
Poetry has power. The power to console. To raise us to action. To make sense of things. To simply be moved. Currently, one way to see poetry is to take it in, let it wash over us, to enjoy the beauty of the art, no matter the message. Beauty redeems. Beauty can give strength. That’s part of art’s gift. Part of poetry’s gift.
Below are three poems for you to consider. Do they have a place in your current experiences? Are they bigger than the pandemic? Can you take them in and swallow them whole?
Note: The Background and Exploration sections are at the bottom of the three poems.
1) Here is a poem that speaks to everyday existence, that reminds us that joy is always a choice, that soothing the mind is possible even in terrible times. We need not look to some future day when “things will be all right again.” The opportunity to be “all right” is right now.
From Blossoms
By Li-Young Lee
From blossoms comes
this brown paper bag of peaches
we bought from the boy
at the bend in the road where we turned toward
signs painted Peaches.
From laden boughs, from hands,
from sweet fellowship in the bins,
comes nectar at the roadside, succulent
peaches we devour, dusty skin and all,
comes the familiar dust of summer, dust we eat.
O, to take what we love inside,
to carry within us an orchard, to eat
not only the skin, but the shade,
not only the sugar, but the days, to hold
the fruit in our hands, adore it, then bite into
the round jubilance of peach.
There are days we live
as if death were nowhere
in the background; from joy
to joy to joy, from wing to wing,
from blossom to blossom to
impossible blossom, to sweet impossible blossom.
Li-Young Lee, “From Blossoms” from Rose. Copyright © 1986 by Li-Young Lee. Reprinted with the permission of BOA Editions Ltd., www.boaeditions.org.
2) As she so often does, Mary Oliver takes us deep into the breast of nature where we can find both ‘terror and comfort in our world and in the universe. We rush toward the pleasant. We avoid the unpleasant. What if we just stood quietly and noticed the instants arising and departing? Without judging. Without preferring. Without clinging. What if we remembered that we are not in control? Would this console us or drive us mad?
In Blackwater Woods
By Mary Oliver
Look, the trees
are turning
their own bodies
into pillars
of light,
are giving off the rich
fragrance of cinnamon
and fulfillment,
the long tapers
of cattails
are bursting and floating away over
the blue shoulders
of the ponds,
and every pond,
no matter what its
name is, is
nameless now.
Every year
everything
I have ever learned
in my lifetime
leads back to this: the fires
and the black river of loss
whose other side
is salvation,
whose meaning
none of us will ever know.
To live in this world
you must be able
to do three things:
to love what is mortal;
to hold it
against your bones knowing
your own life depends on it;
and, when the time comes to let it go,
to let it go.
“In Blackwater Woods” by Mary Oliver, from American Primitive. © Back Bay Books, 1983.
3) Now here’s a final poem that the Buddha, himself, would eat for breakfast. Death happens. And the world remains beautiful.
Everything Is Going To Be All Right
By Derek Mahon
How should I not be glad to contemplate
the clouds clearing beyond the dormer window
and a high tide reflected on the ceiling?
There will be dying, there will be dying,
but there is no need to go into that.
The poems flow from the hand unbidden
and the hidden source is the watchful heart.
The sun rises in spite of everything
and the far cities are beautiful and bright.
I lie here in a riot of sunlight
watching the day break and the clouds flying.
Everything is going to be all right.
Background
As that days of “the virus” pile up, week after week, month after month, and we can only hope it won’t come to year after year, the human race, already stressed [hasn’t it always been so?] now has to contend with an invisible, invasive enemy that is killing thousands and thousands of us. When this whole business started earlier this year, it got me thinking, “Just one more thing.” Of course, it’s one more BIG thing, not typical of a day in the life of a Western citizen. On the other hand, behind the scenes, everyday existence continues to us from a state of terror to satisfaction to that-was-average, to mild anxiety, to terror, to . . . Well, you get it: Life – each of our lives – is always on the move. The Buddhists call this impermanence. It’s a fact that most people experience as unpleasant.
In any case, all this got me thinking whether poets have anything to offer to make this experience we call life easier, easier to understand, easier to bear.
Exploration 1: Are you anxious about “the virus”? If so, does it surpass other factors that make you anxious? If you do not feel anxious, to what do you attribute your capacity to stay balanced?
Exploration 2: Does poetry do us any favors in “times like these”? Does poetry matter?
Exploration 3: Whose life matters?
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